Ive decided to re-run the current review under the old rules. One because I am bored, and two to see what the partisan effect would be; would it be more favourable to the Tories than the current review?

The electorate of England was 38,443,481. Divided by the number of seats (533) gives us a quota of 72,127.

PART 1: The Mets.

London.

London has specific rules. Boroughs can only be grouped together if the average number of electors per constituency was more than +/- 10,000 of the national quota. The seats should not be greater than the sum of the seats to which each of the paired boroughs were respectively entitled and groupings should not cross the Thames below the Borough of Richmond.

I retained the groupings that exist if the numbers required it, or split groupings and created new ones. I have went over the system twice and hopefully havent messed up

Havering, Barking  4

Redbridge (decoupled)  3

Waltham Forest (decoupled) - 2

Newham, Tower Hamlets  Coupled  5 (an increase, collectively of 1)

Greenwich, Bexley  5

Southwark, Lewisham, Bromley  8

Lambeth  3 (decoupled from above group)

Croydon  3

Sutton  2

Merton  2

Wandsworth  3

Richmond, Kingston  3

Hounslow  2

Ealing  3

Hammersmith and Fulham, Kensington and Chelsea  2

Westminster, City of London  2

Hillingdon (decoupled)  3

Camden (decoupled)  2

Islington  2

Hackney  2

Haringey  2

Enfield  3

Barnet  3

Brent, Harrow  5

So some of the groupings have been broken or shrunk. The only increase that would take place in Greater London is in Newham/Tower Hamlets which together would be entitled to 5 seats, up 1. No part of London would loose seats. Some seats would be up for abolition however as a result of some of the changes. Tessa Jowells Dulwich and West Norwood would be a likely casualty. In terms of North West London, the situation in Hillingdon and Camden would return to how it was pre 2005. Likewise in Brent and Harrow (with some changes)

Greater Manchester

Entitled to 27.146 seats = 27 same as last time (though the entitlement is down a notch) There are minor changes to entitlements to each of the boroughs, but when grouped together as they were there is no change to the entitlements

Merseysides entitlement would be 14.01; down 1 seat since the last review.

Wirral would have an entitlement of 3.32 seats giving it 3 seats with an average electorate of 79,800. The rest of Merseyside has a quota of 10.694. Ideally, a constituency could cross the Wirral to ensure that the Wirral seats are not too large. However despite transport links, such a proposal would not be welcomed. The alternative would be for the first time since reorganisation, combining the Wirral with Cheshire. Doing so would give Cheshire/Wirral a quota of 14 seats exactly.

South Yorkshire would be entitled to 13.51 seats, down a little since the last review. It would be entitled to 14 seats, so no change. What makes this difficult is that while Doncaster is entitled to 3 seats (with a quota of 3.056), the remainder of the old Met is entitled to 10.454 seats which is technically below the Commissions rounding up point (10.476). So the whole Met would loose a seat. I doubt that they would adopt this approach and would plump for having below quota seats

So:

Barnsley, Rotherham, Sheffield  11Doncaster - 3

West Yorkshire

Last time, the old met was allocated 22 seats (though an argument was made that it should be 23) The electorate has now fallen (21.856) giving an entitlement of 22 seats. Treating each borough separately and rounding up would give the whole area 23 seats

Bradfords electorate has fallen, going from an entitlement of 4.95 to just 4.58. Calderdale would be entitled to exactly 2 seats. Continuing to pair Leeds and Wakefield gives 11 seats. By reviewing Bradford and Kirklees together (although they could be looked at separately if you follow the rounding up rule), you get an entitlement of 8.798 or 9 seats giving 22 seats.

So

Leeds, Wakefield  11Bradford, Kirklees  9Calderdale - 2

The Bradford, Kirklees pairing depends on what constituencies can be created.

West Midlands

Entitled to 27 (26.931) seats. This is a reduction of 1 seat. The question is, where is this seat to be lost from?

Birmingham (10.145) would be entitled to 10 seats as at present. Coventry would be entitled to 3 so also steady. Dudley, Sandwell, Wolverhampton were grouped at the last review. Doing so again would entitle them to 9 seats (8.792), 1 less than was allocated at the last review. Indeed, Sandwell (3.046) could be granted 3 full seats on its own. So the loss would be one of the Wolverhampton/Dudley seats. Solihull would be entitled to 2 seats and Wallsall to 3 seats.

Tyne and Wear would be entitled to 11.483 seats. Last time the area was allocated 12 seats. Allocating 12 again is closer to the quota than allocating 11 but only by 63 electors. In situations like these, there is some discretion awarded to the commission; how can they best create a pattern of 12 seats? If treated separately, the combined boroughs would also have 12 seats.

Gateshead would get 2 (2.043) and Sunderland 3 (3.003). Newcastle would be entitled to 2.681 which if combined with North Tyneside would give 5 seats (4.883) The awkward borough is South Tyneside, entitled to 1.604. Two seats would be far under quota. There is no where else for it to expand. Sunderland is bang on quota. North Tyneside is across a natural boundary. The only option is to continue its linkage with Gateshead giving the grouping an entitlement of 3.647 or 4 seats.

Thanks The electorate in England has jumped significantly since the last review meaning that the average electorate (n/533) would be higher today at any post-war review IIRC. My feeling is that depending on how some of the seats were drawn and given how stark the result was in som, growing parts of the countrry, the Tories could have a stronger advantage under the old system than they do under the new.

So we have 5 new seats created here, with one being added to the Isle of Wight. Given the patterns of support across the affected counties, particularly at the last election it is possible that all 5 created seats would be notionally Tory. The marginality of other seats would be in question, but not too much given how stark the results were here.

Here is a re-jigging of Greater Manchester. I've marked out the only change to the Manchester seat; the transferral of one ward. Major changes to the east creating Oldham, Royton and Shaw, Hyde, Stalybridge and a substantial redrawing of the other seats.

If you can give me what you think the quota would be I could try and give you a 15 seat Lancashire

72,127 voters per seat is the national quota. In Lancashire we're looking at seats of about 74,118 voters each. Looking at the map, I think we would see Wyre and Preston North dissappear again. Preston is 13,000 voters short and Blackpool South is 10,000 voters short. So it would be a Tory seat down; however the tranferral of voters elsewhere could hit some of the marginals.

I couldn't model West Yorkshire very well as the wards are so out of date. Leeds Central has an electorate of 81,000 and it's hard to dissipate that anywhere in the Leeds area.

South Yorkshire would be entitled to 13.51 seats, down a little since the last review. It would be entitled to 14 seats, so no change. What makes this difficult is that while Doncaster is entitled to 3 seats (with a quota of 3.056), the remainder of the old Met is entitled to 10.454 seats which is technically below the Commissions rounding up point (10.476). So the whole Met would loose a seat. I doubt that they would adopt this approach and would plump for having below quota seats

So:

Barnsley, Rotherham, Sheffield  11Doncaster - 3

Yes, they used to use county entitlements -- see the West Midlands last time -- so South Yorkshire would have retained 14 seats. I suspect there might have been no changes at all; the low electorate of the Rotherham seat might have been a concern, but any simple way of dealing it would have brought another seat's electorate down to similar levels. I'd probably have suggested moving Sitwell ward from Rother Valley to Rotherham, on the grounds that (a) that's where it (or most of its electorate, at any rate) ought to be anyway (b) it looks like the lowest electorate in the county (now Rother Valley) is slightly higher that way. The presumption in favour of the status quo might have worked against that, and would probably have made suggesting any other changes a waste of time.

London has specific rules. Boroughs can only be grouped together if the average number of electors per constituency was more than +/- 10,000 of the national quota. The seats should not be greater than the sum of the seats to which each of the paired boroughs were respectively entitled and groupings should not cross the Thames below the Borough of Richmond.

I don't think this was a Rule but was the Commission's policy. Same effect unless a blindingly good reason is evidenced to breach it.

I don't have the numbers to hand but the fact the two Tower Hamlets seats are in the 72,810-80,473 range suggests this would mean probably only one Tower Hamlets ward in a West Ham seat. This would be a bit daft and I suggest in practice the link would be broken and Newham given three seats, and the larger disparity accepted.

Commission's policy was to pair London boroughs but not group. The exception was City/K&C/Westminster in 1995 but the City was too small to count as a borough; somewhere I have the Fourth Periodic Report and will see what the justification was. I'd bet it was something on the lines that for Parliamentary representation the City was effectively an added-on ward of Westminster now.

If you look at the Assistant Commissioner's Report for Islington last time, he rejected the Tory plan to link Islington/Hackney/Tower Hamlets, largely on the grounds you couldn't group three boroughs.

Merseysides entitlement would be 14.01; down 1 seat since the last review.

Wirral would have an entitlement of 3.32 seats giving it 3 seats with an average electorate of 79,800. The rest of Merseyside has a quota of 10.694. Ideally, a constituency could cross the Wirral to ensure that the Wirral seats are not too large. However despite transport links, such a proposal would not be welcomed. The alternative would be for the first time since reorganisation, combining the Wirral with Cheshire. Doing so would give Cheshire/Wirral a quota of 14 seats exactly.

South Yorkshire would be entitled to 13.51 seats, down a little since the last review. It would be entitled to 14 seats, so no change. What makes this difficult is that while Doncaster is entitled to 3 seats (with a quota of 3.056), the remainder of the old Met is entitled to 10.454 seats which is technically below the Commissions rounding up point (10.476). So the whole Met would loose a seat. I doubt that they would adopt this approach and would plump for having below quota seats

You're right to doubt; if I remember right, it wouldn't work like that. The county is entitled to 14 so 14 it gets, regardless of whether the individual borough entitlements add up to something else.

Last time, the old met was allocated 22 seats (though an argument was made that it should be 23) The electorate has now fallen (21.856) giving an entitlement of 22 seats. Treating each borough separately and rounding up would give the whole area 23 seats

Bradfords electorate has fallen, going from an entitlement of 4.95 to just 4.58. Calderdale would be entitled to exactly 2 seats. Continuing to pair Leeds and Wakefield gives 11 seats. By reviewing Bradford and Kirklees together (although they could be looked at separately if you follow the rounding up rule), you get an entitlement of 8.798 or 9 seats giving 22 seats.

So

Leeds, Wakefield  11Bradford, Kirklees  9Calderdale - 2

The Bradford, Kirklees pairing depends on what constituencies can be created.

Do you have the individual borough entitlements? I wonder if it's possible to take Leeds down to 7 and restore the Wakefield/Kirklees link, and leave Bradford alone.

Tyne and Wear would be entitled to 11.483 seats. Last time the area was allocated 12 seats. Allocating 12 again is closer to the quota than allocating 11 but only by 63 electors. In situations like these, there is some discretion awarded to the commission; how can they best create a pattern of 12 seats? If treated separately, the combined boroughs would also have 12 seats.

11.483 is above the harmonic mean, so they have discretion to keep it at 12, and as leaving it at 12 allows no change (and avoids having to bring back Tyne Bridge). I'd lay odds that if they were faced with this in reality they might try for a complete no change in Tyne & Wear.

Last time, the old met was allocated 22 seats (though an argument was made that it should be 23) The electorate has now fallen (21.856) giving an entitlement of 22 seats. Treating each borough separately and rounding up would give the whole area 23 seats

Bradfords electorate has fallen, going from an entitlement of 4.95 to just 4.58. Calderdale would be entitled to exactly 2 seats. Continuing to pair Leeds and Wakefield gives 11 seats. By reviewing Bradford and Kirklees together (although they could be looked at separately if you follow the rounding up rule), you get an entitlement of 8.798 or 9 seats giving 22 seats.

So

Leeds, Wakefield  11Bradford, Kirklees  9Calderdale - 2

The Bradford, Kirklees pairing depends on what constituencies can be created.

Do you have the individual borough entitlements? I wonder if it's possible to take Leeds down to 7 and restore the Wakefield/Kirklees link, and leave Bradford alone.

Seven Leeds seats on December 2010 electorates would have an average electorate of 77,905. Which is OK, except that as Leeds has 33 wards (and I think we can assume no split wards for the purposes of this thread) I expect some of the seats would have to be considerably bigger than that.

Five Bradford seats would have an average electorate of 65,991. Bradford has 30 wards, so that might work out reasonably well, though they'd probably all be a bit small. (EDIT: of course we can just keep the existing seats if we're doing this. None of them are horrendously small, so that's OK.)

Eight seats covering Kirklees and Wakefield would have an average electorate of 69,579.

I wonder about pairing Leeds and Bradford for twelve seats with a cross-border seat in the north, which might be called "Otley and Ilkley"?

I found East Lancs a nightmare too. Extending Pendle towards Clitheroe (and having Burnley extend towards Nelson) worked, as did everything else until I got to Blackpool. I see you've divided Preston; that would probably be more welcomed than my Hyndburn seat

Thanks The electorate in England has jumped significantly since the last review meaning that the average electorate (n/533) would be higher today at any post-war review IIRC. My feeling is that depending on how some of the seats were drawn and given how stark the result was in som, growing parts of the countrry, the Tories could have a stronger advantage under the old system than they do under the new.

So we have 5 new seats created here, with one being added to the Isle of Wight. Given the patterns of support across the affected counties, particularly at the last election it is possible that all 5 created seats would be notionally Tory. The marginality of other seats would be in question, but not too much given how stark the results were here.

True for the most part. I've played with various likely boundaries before (when I expected the next review would be on this basis) and in Suffolk at least you would tend to find that the creation of an extra safe Tory seat could well result in pushing two existing seats (Ipswich and Waveney) into the Labour column on 2010 figures. Oxford W & Abingdon would probably go back to the LDs as well given the nature of the changes which would be necessitated there

Haven't got the old rules to hand but pretty sure you can't cross a met county boundary. Wirral would just have to go down to three.

I got the impression at the last review that the Commission would've been willing to consider pairing Merseyside and Cheshire. They mentioned the possibility but dismissed it because no-one was interested in the idea. Part of the problem was that Cheshire was reviewed 2 years before Merseyside!

Haven't got the old rules to hand but pretty sure you can't cross a met county boundary. Wirral would just have to go down to three.

I got the impression at the last review that the Commission would've been willing to consider pairing Merseyside and Cheshire. They mentioned the possibility but dismissed it because no-one was interested in the idea. Part of the problem was that Cheshire was reviewed 2 years before Merseyside!

I think the fact that they reviewed Cheshire 2 years before Merseyside indicates that they didn't want to pair them. I'm pretty sure there was nothing in the rules which absolutely stopped a Met county being paired -- I think all administrative counties, whether shire, Met or unitary, formally had the same status, and a lot of unitaries were paired with their neighbours -- but the Commission largely continued to work with the 1974 counties, including H*mb*rs*d*.

Of course their idea of how to get round Wirral's awkward entitlement last time involved a ridiculous cross-Mersey seat which no-one wanted (sound familiar?) and they'd effectively ruled out the Cheshire option, which is why Wirral ended up with four undersized seats.

Haven't got the old rules to hand but pretty sure you can't cross a met county boundary. Wirral would just have to go down to three.

I got the impression at the last review that the Commission would've been willing to consider pairing Merseyside and Cheshire. They mentioned the possibility but dismissed it because no-one was interested in the idea. Part of the problem was that Cheshire was reviewed 2 years before Merseyside!

I think the fact that they reviewed Cheshire 2 years before Merseyside indicates that they didn't want to pair them. I'm pretty sure there was nothing in the rules which absolutely stopped a Met county being paired -- I think all administrative counties, whether shire, Met or unitary, formally had the same status, and a lot of unitaries were paired with their neighbours -- but the Commission largely continued to work with the 1974 counties, including H*mb*rs*d*.

I think under the old rules anything was theoretically possible because of Rule 7 (and I quote "It shall not be the duty of a Boundary Commission to aim at giving full effect in all circumstances to the above rules...") but it's pretty clear that they ought to respect M*rs*ys*d*, H*mb*rs*d*, etc. if they can, so long as nothing completely potty happened. Would an 85,000 electorate Wirral West be completely hatstand? There's a 91,000 electorate East Ham now.

Of course their idea of how to get round Wirral's awkward entitlement last time involved a ridiculous cross-Mersey seat which no-one wanted (sound familiar?) and they'd effectively ruled out the Cheshire option, which is why Wirral ended up with four undersized seats.

Well, and the fact there was such an excellent proposal on the table from the Tory Party. It's a bit like Labour getting the review they want in Surrey...

RULES FOR REDISTRIBUTION OF SEATS(Schedule 2 to the Parliamentary Constituencies Act 1986)

The Rules

1. (1) The number of constituencies in Great Britain shall not be substantially greater orless than 613.(2)  repealed by the Scotland Act 1988.(3) The number of constituencies in Wales shall not be less than 35.(4) The number of constituencies in Northern Ireland shall not be greater than 18 orless than 16, and shall be 17 unless it appears to the Boundary Commission forNorthern Ireland that Northern Ireland should for the time being be divided into 16 or(as the case may be) into 18 constituencies.

2. Every constituency shall return a single member.

3. There shall continue to be a constituency which shall include the whole of the City ofLondon and the name of which shall refer to the City of London.

3A. A constituency which includes the Orkney Islands or the Shetland Islands shall notinclude the whole or any part of a local government area other than the Orkney Islandsand the Shetland Islands.

4. (1) So far as is practicable having regard to rules 1 to 3A-(a) in England and Wales,-(i) no county or any part of a county shall be included in a constituencywhich includes the whole or part of any other county or the whole or part ofa London borough,(ii) no London borough or any part of a London borough shall beincluded in a constituency which includes the whole or part of any otherLondon borough,(b) in Scotland, regard shall be had to the boundaries of local authority areas,(c) in Northern Ireland, no ward shall be included partly in one constituency andpartly in another.(1A) In sub-paragraph (1)(a) above county means in relation to Wales, a preservedcounty (as defined by section 64 of the Local Government (Wales) Act 1994).(2) In sub-paragraph (1)(b) above "area and "local authority" have the same meaningsas in the Local Government (Scotland) Act 1973.

5. The electorate of any constituency shall be as near the electoral quota as is practicablehaving regard to rules 1 to 4; and a Boundary Commission may depart from the strictapplication of rule 4 if it appears to them that a departure is desirable to avoid anexcessive disparity between the electorate of any constituency and the electoral quota,or between the electorate of any constituency and that of neighbouring constituenciesin the part of the United Kingdom with which they are concerned.

6. A Boundary Commission may depart from the strict application of rules 4 and 5 ifspecial geographical considerations, including in particular the size, shape andaccessibility of a constituency, appear to them to render departure desirable.

General and supplementary

7. It shall not be the duty of a Boundary Commission to aim at giving full effect in allcircumstances to the above rules (except rule 3A) but they shall take account, so far asthey reasonably can-(a) of the inconveniences attendant on alterations of constituencies other thanalterations made for the purposes of rule 4, and(b) of any local ties which would be broken by such alterations.

8. In the application of rule 5 to each part of the United Kingdom for which there is aBoundary Commission -(a) the expression electoral quota means a number obtained by dividing theelectorate for that part of the United Kingdom by the number of constituenciesin it existing on the enumeration date,(b) the expression electorate means-(i) in relation to a constituency, the number of persons whose namesappear on the register of parliamentary electors in force on the enumerationdate under the Representation of the People Acts for the constituency,(ii) in relation to the part of the United Kingdom, the aggregate electorateas defined in sub-paragraph (i) above of all the constituencies in that part(c) the expression enumeration date means, in relation to any report of aBoundary Commission under this Act, the date on which the notice with respectto that report is published in accordance with section 5(1) of this Act.

9. In this Schedule, a reference to a rule followed by a number is a reference to the ruleset out in the correspondingly numbered paragraph of this Schedule.